![[Photo: Pretty yellow boat at Friday Harbor]](fridboat.jpg)
In which Larry, against all odds, injures himself on a dead whale... On the value of manners... How many crewmembers does it take to fill up a water tank?...
Friday Harbor 1998 Aug 03 Monday
I woke up in the Salon, saw that Larry was up, gathered my things and walked down to the lavatories to wake up and take a shower. On the way, I paid for the parking on the breakwater ($21.50, at 75 cents a foot). This gave me a chance to explore Friday Harbor at 7:30, and look around. After I was done, I came back to the boat. By this time, Lea was up, and Larry was walking off to do what I just did. I talked to the Jolly Dragon's skipper again, and asked him on pointers as to where to go, what to do, and how to go about doing it. He dragged out a huge map, and proceeded to tell me about the wonders of the San Juan islands, the windless nature of the place, the choicest harbors and places to drop anchor, and lots of other stuff which I promptly forgot. He told me that our intention to sail straight to Sidney was too aggressive, and I surmised from that that on a sailboat as with everything else, less was more.
Breakfast then, was a matter of poring over similar charts with my crew, and discussing possible destinations. We settled on Reid harbor for the night, with the intent of sailing to Sidney the next day. That gave us plenty of time to go to the Whale Museum, which was on Larry and Lea's "to-do" list for the day. We all headed there as soon as we locked up the boat, and proceeded to enjoy ourselves in the small museum. All throughout, I wondered if we'd get a chance to see these creatures, as adapted to sound as we are to light, yet so like us that they have to surface to breathe, and live as long as we do even in the wild.
Having visited Taiji's whaling museum, I wanted to see what a museum was like that wasn't playing apologist to the whaling industry. In the museum, the first thing I saw was a big TV showing whales frolicking. The second thing I saw was the glass display case showing many products made from whales: oil, canned whale meat. There didn't really seem to be any censure.
Hell, I don't know. I keep hearing about how wasteful it is to kill whales. I keep hearing that there's easier substitutes for everything you can get from whales. But then, maybe I'm hearing from biased people. I mean, I keep hearing about the economic brilliance of hemp clothing, too.
Killing whales still seems dumb to me, though.
I wandered through the museum, looking at maps and pictures, reading interpretive text. Trying to read the text with one display, I stepped back and clonked my head on something. I looked up. I'd clonked my head on a whale rib. I was standing under a whale skeleton, which was hanging from the ceiling. "Sorry!" I yelped, ducking and backing away. I looked around. No-one else was looking. Whew. That was pretty embarrassing.
Still, I was glad to be at a whale museum where the interpretive text was in English. I learned some things. E.g., whales that sift sea-water for krill have extra-salty pee.
I bought a few postcards, and was about to buy stamps when I realized how given that the next stop was Sidney, Canada, there wasn't much point. Hence we bought some food, and went back to the boat. We first motored out to the fuel dock to gas up ($2 in diesel), and then asked around for a pump-out station to pump out our holding tank.
When we were coming up to the fuel dock, I must have been kind of out of it. I was just looking down at my shoes, holding a dock line. All of the sudden, there's this voice: "Gimme the line!" There was a lady on the dock in a uniform--a gas station attendant. She wanted me to toss her a dock line so that she could help us tie up. I was a clueless dimwit. I handed over the line. She tied it up expertly. She wandered up to the front of the boat where Lea was finding out that our front dock-line and our anchor were topologically complicated. If you'd been tied up on one side and wanted to tie up on the other, you had to mess around with the front line for a bit, otherwise it would end up trying to tug the anchor into the hull. Thus, Lea was scrambling. "Gimme the dang line!" Ohh, the attendant was grumpy now. We were the biggest chumps. Lea got the line sorted out, handed it over.
We filled up with fuel. The pump works like the pump at a regular gas station. However, to open up the cap of the fuel tank, you winch it open. It doesn't take a lot of force--they just have a winch-handle-shaped socket in the cap, so you have to use a winch to get the cap off. Maybe it makes the experience seem more nautical.
Someone paid for the gas. We wanted to know where the pump-out was. The obvious thing to do was to ask the gas station attendant. I looked at her. She still looked grumpy. I really didn't want to talk to her. I looked all over the fuel dock. Maybe the pump-out was here. No sign of a pump-out. I sighed. Lea and I approached the attendant. I meekly asked her where we could get water and a pump-out. She told us. I gave her my meekest thanks for this. She seemed to soften, and gave us a couple of landmarks so that we could find our way. Remember kids: if you can't be a competent sailor, you might as well be polite.
Having found the pump out station, we proceeded to power up to it only find it occupied. We docked nearby, filled the boat up with water, and then worked our way back to the pump out station.
Filling up the boat with water was kind of an involved process. We needed to tie up at a dock. Since we were in a marina, it wasn't so hard to find a dock--we were surrounded by them. Each dock seemed to sport a sign saying that it was the property of some sailing club or another. We just wanted to tie up long enough to grab some water and get gone. We pulled up to a dock, tied off; perhaps we were trespassing. Tying off went smoothly--with fresh lessons from the fuel dock, everyone was on the ball. I grabbed a hose and brought it over to the boat. The rest of the crew filled up the tank. This involved taking the cap off (as with the fuel tank cap, this involved a winch handle) and running the hose. This boat didn't have a stiff water tank, but a "bladder"--a thick, flexible bag. As you filled it up, air could get trapped in the top of the bag, unable to escape, taking away precious water space. Someone sat next to the bladder, pressing it to force out the air bubbles--"burping" the bag.
We also had a jerry can, which we wanted to fill up water as an emergency supply. The rest of the crew was done filling up the boat's main water tank and were scurrying around doing things. I was standing on the dock, reeling in the hose. Scarlet fetched up the jerry can, put it on the edge of the boat, in easy reach; then got called away for a second. I grabbed the jerry can and put it on the dock so that I could get the hose into it and fill it with ease. Scarlet came back. Piaw glanced over and said, "I suggest you put that can on deck so you don't have to lift it while it's full." Scarlet grumbled, "That's what I was fuckin' gonna do." I apologized to Scarlet for moving the can. "Oh, it's not you I'm mad at," she replied. Oh great. We weren't even out of the harbor this morning and Scarlet was mad about something.
As we filled up, we'd noticed a boat going past--the boat which had been at the pump-out station. So we went back, knowing that we'd no longer have to wait. After all, pumping out seemed more ecologically sound than dumping into Canadian waters, even if the Canadians didn't seem to mind.
Of course the Canadians don't mind. It all drifts back into U.S. waters with the change of the tides anyway. Whatever goes around, comes around.
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